The Federal Reserve’s record of oppression

Drew Sheets, Opinion EditorJanuary 31, 2012

About five years ago I heard a troubling claim. The claim was that our central bank was oppressive to American workers and needed to be dismantled. After a little homework, I found the claim to be correct.

There is no mention of a central bank in any of America’s founding documents. The founders knew what would happen to the economy and the workers in this country if control of the supply of money was put in the hands of a few “trusted” bankers. As Thomas Jefferson said, “If the American people ever allow the banks to control the issuance of their currency, first by inflation then by deflation, the banks and corporations that grow up around them will deprive the people of all property until their children wake up homeless on the continent that their fathers occupied.” If this doesn’t ring a bell, you’ve been living under a rock for the past three years.

Article 1 of the Constitution explicitly gives the power to print money to Congress. Controlling the money supply is indeed our government’s job.
President Woodrow Wilson signed the Federal Reserve Act into law on Dec. 23, 1913. It was sold to the public with a promise to end the threat of recessions and depressions. Less than 20 years later, the country went bankrupt and experienced the largest depression in its history.
Let me briefly describe to you one way that the Federal Reserve Bank (FRB) is inherently oppressive to the workers in this country. It’s all about the purchasing power of the dollar. Every time the FRB dumps money into the economic system, the value or purchasing power of the dollar goes down because the monetary supply is inflated.

If a huge bank takes out a $2 billion loan and loans that money to a corporation, by the time that money trickles down through the banks and corporations, to the hands of the laborer, that money has been in circulation long enough to make the purchasing power of that dollar significantly less. This gives large banks and corporations a significant advantage against smaller competitors who might not have the collateral or just might not qualify to get the best interest rates from the FRB.

If you get a loan from a smaller bank that borrows money from larger banks, that’s even worse. Smaller banks are forced to raise customer interest rates because they have to pay the interest to the bank they borrowed the money from. Those banks must cover their interest from the FRB, then the smaller bank has to hit you up for their own operating costs and every one of those banks makes a profit off you. Not only does this process create extra costs, making you pay more for your loans, but the money you are loaned actually buys you less. Pretty neat little scheme, huh?

The most influential central banker of all time, Mayor Amsted Rothschild, has only one famous quote and it goes like this, “Permit me to issue and control the money of the nation, and I care not who makes the laws.” He knew that no matter why the government took out a loan, whether it be to finance its policies for war, social programs or natural disaster relief, every dime he loaned out would come back with interest. It automatically forces the government into another loan, making him too big to fail.

With the transformation of our country over time, a central bank may be a necessary evil to fund our government, some argue the contrary, but with its inherently oppressive design, Americans should demand that it be reformed and put it under the control of Congress, just as our founders intended.